From the depths of hellfire comes Vacation Friends 2 (now streaming on Hulu), the sequel to 2020’s Vacation Friends, a forgettable movie from the era of COVID that we wish we could forget. The first movie must have been a decent enough hit for Hulu – this being the anti-transparency streaming era, one can only make vague assumptions about such things – to warrant a reunion of principal cast members John Cena, Lil Rel Howery, Yvonne Orji, Meredith Hagner and Carlos Santos, who once again convene for a series of theoretically hilarious misadventures during a Caribbean vacation. Note the word “theoretically,” which implies that it likely isn’t hilarious, considering the precedent set by the first movie, which I’d forgotten I’d actually seen. So we’re already getting off on the wrong foot here, but maybe the second time’s the charm? Seems doubtful!
The Gist: As you surely probably don’t recall from Vacation Friends: Part One – Dead By Dawn, Marcus (Howery) and Emily (Orji) are the nice, calm couple and Ron (Cena) and Kyla (Hagner) are the pardy-hardy wackos. Both got married, and now they’re reuniting at a Caribbean resort to see if they can replicate the shitloads of “fun” they had before, for no reason other than because the screenwriters couldn’t come up with a fresh concept. It is revealed that Marcus and Emily are trying to get pregnant. Ever the yin to their yang, Kyla and Ron did the irresponsible thing and passed their maniac genes down to their new baby, who’ll be cared for by Maurillio (Santos), the hotelier they’ve hired to be their nanny, and the character whose pending subplot is immediately cuttable from this 105-minute movie that should be an 85-minute movie, and will therefore never be mentioned again in this review. Now: Are you ready for some hijinks? You’d better be.
The reason they’re at this specific swank-ass hotel is because Marcus is hoping his construction company can secure a deal with its Korean owners to build a new hotel in Chicago. And so Marcus meets with company rep Yeon (Ronny Chieng), and it all goes smoothly and without a single hitch and our principals all celebrate with a nice evening out where they get a little tipsy and go dancing and maybe stay out a bit too late, and Ron won’t blast cocaine into Kyla’s anus because everyone here is a perfectly not-unhinged person. No! I’m lying. In reality, Marcus is nervous as hell and it seems inevitable that wildcard lunatics like Ron and Kyla will make everything more dangerous and complicated, and it’s also inevitable that there’ll be a scene in which Ron blasts cocaine into Kyla’s anus. It’s a given. THIS is what you pay your Hulu subscription fees for, my friends.
However, it doesn’t quite play out how you’d expect, because the primary agent of chaos is Kyla’s estranged father Reese (Steve Buscemi), who shows up primarily so you don’t get Vacation Friends 2 confused with Vacation Friends. They’re estranged because he just got out of San Quentin Prison, and turned up at the resort to surprise her. Reese, of course, is shadier than an umbrella-sales convention, so his arrival initiates a string of “comical” mishaps involving, but not strictly limited to, the following vacation activities: surfing, snorkeling, boating, gambling, drinking, etc. This character makes sure the movie is less like, I dunno, Monte Carlo or Fire Island, and more like Sicario if it was made by peabrained dolts. You’ve been warned!
What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: You sure this isn’t a Happy Madison production?
Performance Worth Watching: Cena’s upbeat, go-for-broke, wide-eyed persona has grown on me since he showed an unusual side of himself alongside Amy Schumer in Trainwreck. He’s consistently the best thing in terrible movies like this one, Playing with Fire and the Fast and Furious films (and the occasional good one, like Suicide Squad).
Memorable Dialogue: Ron breaks the news to Marcus when he comes to, post-mishap: “Your butthole threw up, bud.”
Sex and Skin: None.
Our Take: I laughed once during Vacation Friends 2, although I don’t remember what specifically I laughed at. Consider the percentage yield: one chuckle sustained for maybe five seconds in, again, a trying 105-minute movie. That’s sub-terrible, especially for a movie featuring two effortlessly funny guys in Howery (who’s been taking any role in any piece of crap offered to him since his Get Out breakout in 2017) and Cena. You should be able to put them in an empty room with blank walls and no script and get better than 0.0769 percent laugh yield. The key factor in that equation is “no script”; the problem with this movie is that it saddles them with its script, which puts them in the middle of the Gobi with a single drop of water between them.
And yet, the cast works reasonably hard to sell this dismal material; they work hard for their paychecks, which surely were fairly big by most standards, but should’ve included a premium for hazard pay. That isn’t to say the material is toxic, but so anti-toxic, so tired and mundane, so forgettably drecky, that it becomes dangerously sleep-inducing. Late in the movie, director Clay Tarver deviates from let’s-get-plowed montages and sloppily conceived comic set pieces into action-comedy territory, as Reese’s legally dubious shenanigans lead them to a situation where they have to dodge bullets and participate in lackluster car chases. Vacation Friends 2 is a phenomenal waste of time and talent, but some of you will mindlessly press play anyway. Please don’t!
Our Call: SKIP IT. Vacation Friends 2? More like Vacation Friends Poo!
John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.